October 1, 2023

Sunday morning we were picked up by our driver for a short drive to the village of Faro, where the Tertulia restaurant is located and we meet Chef Suzanna Santos. Suzanna is a delightful young lady from Brazil who will teach us how to prepare a traditional seafood dish Cataplana, which will be our lunch. Our first step will be to go to the local market place to select the key ingredient’s. For a Sunday morning the market is busy, since in addition to being where you buy groceries its a meeting place, coffee shop ,restaurant and social center. In addition to purchasing our raw material we observe how food is displayed and sold in Portugal.

We then went back to the restaurant to a private kitchen to learn about Cataplana, which is the name of a special vessel used to cook a Portuguese Fish Stew. Suzzanne instructed and we do the various steps in the process, cutting vegetable’s, fish and several types of prawns. Joyce and Marilyn are the main chefs with Gil doing a little cutting and acting as photographer. It’s not only instructional but a lot of fun.

It was a beautiful sunny day so our Cataplana was served in the courtyard of the restaurant with a very nice Portuguese Vino Verde, which turned out to be our favorite white wine. The Cataplana was delicious capping off a special learning/dining experience. After lunch we returned to our hotel to do some more exploring including a visit to the beach. In the evening we dine at another one of the great restaurants of Villa Vita Park. So much great food!